Letter 71

Dear Family and Friends....

This week was a week of MIRACLES! But first let’s talk about the regular business...
I would love for you to send me some new ties for Christmas... I'm kinda sick of my ties and we cant buy or trade any until we hit 100 baptisms in a month. Oh and I would love some “Punkin” Cookies. You know... the ones I really like. And... I'll try to think of some more things. Yes we do have plans for Thanksgiving and I will be taken care of. You don’t have to worry about that basically ever mom. The members down here are very civilized and love missionaries. I'm in America. haha. I have 3 memory cards but one of them has pictures of our family and my friends and I sometimes like to show people them. So I'll just send the other one that is full. The box I'm sending is almost ready.

District Meeting went well as we focused on our finding efforts and focusing on families. I committed the District to utilize the technique of offering blessings, because I know that it works. My inspiration came from Elder Ryan Skousen because it sounds like his mission is exploding because of their emphasis on offering blessings! I really believe that the mission needs to be using this technique more to be able to unlock our potential. It’s a great way to get into a door and help the people in the home feel the spirit and recognize us as representatives of Christ.

The District as I said did really well this week. The North Elders found a great family of 6 and then another college age kid and all have BD's (fyi the family accepted a return appointment after the Elders blessed their home). And they'll be baptizing a woman this next Sunday.

Elder Williams and I saw a lot of miracles this week! We have been trying really hard to find new investigators and just as it seemed like we wouldn't hit our goal we got 4 new investigators on Sunday! Elder Williams and I started a fast that day that we would know what to do to help our area and to find new investigators. A few days before we had received 2 referrals from the South sisters and we tried to contact them both twice but had no luck. The sisters had invited 1 of them, a guy they met walking his dogs, to church and we weren't really sure how committed he was... BUT he came with his girl friend and her two kids who are 11 and 7. Turns out he's super interested AND his girl friend has already met with the missionaries for years in Minnesota and believes its all true, but just never could get baptized! So they’re pretty cool. Then a member invited the other referral we got to church and he came and loved it too! His name is Mario and he's 64 years old. He's super cool and does wildlife painting in his free time. He accepted a BD right off the bat and in his prayer at the end of our lesson mentioned how excited he was to be Baptized! haha it was amazing!

Hno Alvarado also came to church and is still on track for his baptism on the 2nd of Dec.

The Beltrans are still there but el hermano had to go to Mexico for work over the weekend. We committed him to go to church down there so hopefully he did. The wife was in Brownsville with her family though and she couldn’t go. :( hopefully they'll be ready by the 2nd as well.

Everything is doing well here in good ol' Edinburg and I'm looking forward to another week of serving the Lord! Have a great week everyone!

-Elder Jordan Stewart